Inspiration: The Untold Stories
by obstreperous
Summary: Untold stories of civilian valour in different chapters of Halo's History.


_**These stories are about the civilian sacrifices of humanity in different chapters of halo's history. This is part 1. Each story is meant to be a mini-story with the view that it will become a anthology of short stories.**_

_**I Do not own Halo  
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Part 1-Defiance 

Time: 109,000 BCE

Place: Charum Hakkor; Capital of the Human Interstellar Empire.

The orbital bombardment of the planet had long ago ceased.

Charum Hakkor. The glorious capital of humanity, a paradise of Precursor technology among the stars, the planet who defied the might of the Forerunner ecumene for 50 years, had finally been brought down to its knees. The military destroyed, the warriors killed in the war, or executed without remorse. A small, selected few, having their minds carefully wiped of any information on the flood, were permitted to surrender. The human and San 'Shyuum civilian population, taking their own lives in mass suicide to both avoid punishments and act as their final show of defiance against the Forerunners. The entire human population of Charum Hakkor, either killed or taken away to be experimented on by the immoral _thing_ they so revered as 'The Librarian'. No bastion of human defence lay in the way of the Forerunners that were scouring the entire planet manually under the watchful eye of their ruthless commander, The Didact.

Well, that was not entirely true. There was that one last facility. But that soon would not be….

The hissing sound temporarily halted. Shakas blew out a breath in relief. The Forerunner assault party had been trying to break through the science facility for over 2 days. The science facility had been prepared for this eventuality well before the battle of Charum Hakkor however, with 2 m of pure unobtainium plates surrounding the walls. Surrounded by this was an incredible impact buffering plastic, and for 2 km around this the rock had been specially treated and heated and interlaced with hard light so as to allow the idea of attacking from below virtually impossible.

Shakas, therefore, was not surprised when the Forerunners had finally given up on direct penetration of the base. He found a grim satisfaction in knowing that the Forerunners were wasting their energy on his base. Its outcome had been predetermined.

Humans had always been good at propaganda indeed, the majority of the civilian population on the planet believed that, if not winning the war, we were fighting to a stalemate. So it was with great trepidation that they found out that they were in the last bastion of human power, and as soon as the Forerunner terms were sent; mass execution, wiping of memories and the devolution of mankind, the proud humans, and not a few San 'Shyuum were committed to mass suicide if Charum Hakkor looked about to fall.

50 years on, Charum Hakkor was about to fall.

Exobiology science facility Alpha lead the way in Flood research, it was they who revealed the cure to the seemingly unstoppable Floods Rampage, albeit at a mortal cost to the human population. If this science facility went into Forerunner hands, all of humanities efforts to conceal the Flood and the cure to the Forerunners would have been in vain. The facility was given top priority and orders that if Charum Hakkor was overrun, the building would be manually detonated to ensure all Flood and cure evidence was destroyed. That was where Shakas, a civilian scientist working in the science facility, came in. He had volunteered to detonate it himself, while the rest of his team either died fighting the Warrior-Servants, or committed suicide. It was a sober action, but the right one, as Shakas so often thought as he shut down areas and turned off life support systems, regretfully seeing his team's continued research waste away.

Shakas was in the command centre, steadying himself for the self-destruct detonation, when the video screen crackled and came to life. On it was no less than a Promethean, its hulking face helmet easily filling the screen.

"The last defiant human" it sneered into the screen. "Surrender, or face the consequences"

Shakas kicked his anti-gravity chair toward the screen, swivelling his chair to meet the Promethean face-to-face.

"A Promethean" Shakas mocked "at my lowly hut, I'm flattered. Yet, somewhat vaguely disappointed that it is not the Didact himself on my screen"

"Our leader is cleansing this planet of any of your technology at this very moment, Heretic"

"Oh! I thought he was looking for the pieces of his spawn. From what I heard their ash is still floating down onto the land".

Shakas was trying to provoke it. He'd always been slightly awed by the mythical status of a promethean. Now, he wanted to see how it would react to those words, remembering way back into his academy days that forerunner troops shared a connection with their commander.

The Promethean's helmet drew closer, and his breathing changed.

"ARROGANT DIRT BEAST, YOU KNOW NOTHING OF OUR LEADERS ACHE" it thundered "YOU HAVE CONFIRMED YOUR SPECIES PUNISHMENT. SURRENDER THIS FACILITY AND YOURSELF AT ONCE!"

Shakas smirked. "Your species trademark arrogance will get you all killed, I have at least that pleasure to know before I die"

"What lies are you speaking, human. I have heard splinters of your prophecy before". The Prometheans curiosity was quite sudden.

Shakas bowed his head and slightly tilted his head to stare at the detonator, a simple thing that looked like one of those ancient mirrors, the reflective surface belying the microscopic needles lying just beneath the surface, ready to explode the refined ultra-unstable Krypton capable of leaving only atomised remains of the research in the explosion-amplifying facility.

"That is not for me to say" Shakas whispered as recollections of the ghastly flood swelled into his mind; thoughts of horrible experiments and pain, both human and flood, of the rough, repulsive feel of a tentacle as the creature grabbed his hand and spoke of past and future in a voice unlike any other. "but I do know that where you will fail, we have triumphed, your suppression of evolution will be at an end, and all will have equal rights"

"You are delusional, purists, killers, usurpers" the Promethean began, then slowly gained momentum "mantle-breakers, planet-takers, here-TICS, PARASITES!"

Shakas laughed. dry and mirthless.

"You haven't even begun to explore the meaning of that word"

He pressed his thumb onto the Primer.

##HUMAN DNA VERIFIED##=

^^SELF-DESTRUCT DETONATION INTIATING IN 5...4...3...2...1…0

##DETONATION INITIATED##


End file.
